The Yard: Building a Destroyer at the Bath Iron Works

New York: HarperCollins, 1999. 1st Edition 1st Printing. Hardcover. As New/As New. First printing. Author signed on the half-title page. Gilt lettering on grey & blue covers in a grey pictorial dust jacket. Shipyard pictorial on the end papers. 8vo, 253pp. Inscription opposite the title page: "To Deacon John, This is about yet another famous person you know. But you're famous here in Lincoln County, Maine! And we're happy you're with us. Love, Donna & Jim. P.S. We're glad Sinbad is here too!" "In Bath, Maine, the birthplace of American shipbuilding, the century-old Bath Iron Works shipyard has been building - largely by hand and with a good dose of tradition - some of the finest, deadliest ships in the U.S. Navy. Accompanied by mounting competition and a pressing need to modernize, the yard faces the year 2000 with changes great and small, most notably in the way it launches ships. No longer will the great gray leviathans roar down the 'ways' - the traditional inclined ramp - into the Kennebec River; this ancient technology will give way to the modern dry dock. 'The Yard' captures this moment, the end of an era in New England history, through the eyes of the workers as they build and launch the 'USS Donald Cook', one of the last ships to be launched the old way. Here the readers step into the daily lives of the shipyard's mechanics - the welders and pipefitters and riggers and shipfitters - as the ship develops. They watch this complex evolution from the first cutting of steel through the dramatic launch and rigorous trials at sea to the destroyer's triumphant commissioning, sharing the moment when the ship's first Navy crew brings her to life. This is a world rich in danger, humor, and shipyard and navy lore, one filled with uncertainty and hope, and not a little fear of change, as this venerable company fights mightily against steep odds to find a new place in a different world. Illustrated throughout with dramatic photographs and detailed drawings, The Yard is not only a fascinating inside look at one of the greatest shipyards in the United States, but also a very human chronicle of the lives of those who work there.